From Gerald (Gerry) Brown, Media Consultant in Hong Kong, the latest buzz on the Digital Broadcasters market in Asia-Pacific, South Asia and the Middle East covering the latest content and hardware moves in HDTV, 3G, IPTV, Mobile TV, terrestrial radio and TV, cable TV, broadband, satellite broadcast and streaming online.

Friday, June 30, 2006

Radio Broadcasters Urged to Diversify into New Media

Heard at the recent Broadcast Asia 2006, Singapore....

Radio broadcasters should adopt ideas seen in other media such as
search engines, digital recording via TiVo, iPods and mobile
broadcasting in order to stay current and relevant to the consumer.

That was a key remark in a presentation by media consultant Jonathan
Marks of Critical Distance.

He said digital broadcasters should be quick to realise that they
have good on-demand content as well as to set up the required
infrastructure to cash in on the current publicity generated by the
technology companies.

“Let the newly rich technology companies pay for the expensive ads to
launch the technology. It’s all useless without the relevant content.
That means a great future for speech, as well as music,” he said.

Mr Marks said radio broadcasters had to recognise what people wanted
and needed, as well as the type of products and services that they
would pay for.

“People will pay for services that communicate status, and they will
also pay to save time. They will not pay for anything that locks them
into something they think they do not need,” he said.

Mr Marks was speaking at the annual RadioAsia conference at the
Singapore Expo, which was jointly organised by the ABU, the Asian
Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) and Singapore
Exhibition Services.

Mr Marks also said that organisations such as the ABU and the
European Broadcasting Union had a big role to play in coordinating
metadata from its members, and ensuring that search engines such as
Google, Blinkx and Technorati are able to access it.

“Hours have been spent (by the ABU and EBU) coordinating frequencies
at international conferences. The result has been better audibility
for members on overcrowded parts of the radio spectrum.

“There is also a role to coordinate metadata. It is important that
all this stuff is found on search engines. Some of these programmes
may start using the web as a form of on-demand distribution,” he said.